A Picture

I have finally cut and pasted a picture off the web of our new home.
Because its winter, it looks different with the aspen tree bare and
no flowers in bloom. But, its the same stucco house and 3 car garage,
which we'll be using for the motorcycles and trailer. And, hopefully
some other stuff too, because our basement storage area is about
1/5 what we had before. Part of that is intentional, though, in our
desire to reduce and simplify. Now we will be forced to have less
with no room to put it all.

The past week has been spent trying to get the house ready for us
to move into at the end of next week. If you know me well enough,
you know that making big decisions can be challenging for me. Well,
I even struggle picking dinner at a restaurant - too many choices. I
really want MyMike to validate things for me, then I'm good to go.
Nevertheless, I have made some decisions without him, and I was
feeling pretty good.

Then came the selection of carpet. So far, this has been the largest
expense, and after a day and a half of going back and forth between
two stores, I had Mike go with me, and he easily made the decision.
Thank you. Good. That's done. Here the installer is separate from
who you order the carpet from. Fortunately, he can get a great pad
for a great deal, so I keep telling myself its worth it.

On to the painters and wood floor man. These are not MUSTs like
the carpet. The previous owner had cats, and Mike and Steven are
allergic, so we had to replace carpet. However, all walls are green, which
we don't want everywhere in our house, and the wood needs to be
refinished, so we might as well do it all before we move in. I met them
all at the house yesterday afternoon. Only the first bid is in so far. All these
decisions all at once, . . . I am about at the end of my decision-making limit.

In the past couple of weeks I've heard a number of comments about how great it must be to be living in a hotel, some even referencing the "Suite Life of Zach and Cody." Without sounding like I'm whining too much, I'd just like to put a couple of things in perspective. 1. The maid only comes by once a week since we are staying for a month. The rest of the week, the burgundy carpet looks bad. When I asked if I could just borrow the vacuum quickly in between, I was told No. 2. Although I brought a crock-pot, there is no room in the mini-fridge for anything more than a gallon of milk, a quart of juice and a small jar of mayo, thus I either must grocery shop every day and/or all leftovers must be thrown away. 3. We cannot afford to eat at a sit-down restaurant every single night. When we do, I always order a salad. Our vegetable consumption has taken a hit, and we miss them all very much. My goal before was half of our plate was veggies. . . I am a new fan of Subway's salad - best $5 I've spent lately. 4. Laundry with quarters in a shared machine. Enough said. 5. This is not a suite. This is two beds, a TV, a desk, a table, two chairs, and a bathroom and closet. That's it. Oh, and our company is picking up the tab, so we really can't complain. We will, however, really be happy to finally get to move into our home! There are things we like, still . . . 1. The indoor pool is great and open until 10. 2. The atrium area is beautiful with leather sofas and a fireplace. 3. They allow Alex, our guinea pig, to stay with us. 4. Free cookies every evening by the front desk. 5. Our location is within a mile of 40 restaurants. One more lesson to teach me not to ever judge. You never know how good or bad something is until you've actually lived it.